


The Deconstruction of Falling Dropships

by HRogge (The_Fenspace_Collective)



Series: Candle In The Dark: A Peculiar Saga of the Sea of Time [8]
Category: BattleTech: MechWarrior, Fenspace
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-09
Updated: 2014-04-09
Packaged: 2018-01-18 17:11:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1436293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Fenspace_Collective/pseuds/HRogge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The Great Pirate Invasion Suite:</i> "Facing a foe they couldn’t hurt fast enough and could hurt them all too well, the Fen fell back on being clever to win the day. And it worked quite well: the dropship Falling Hammer was overwhelmed by an army of repair droids that cut their way through a weak spot in the dropship’s armor, swarmed the engineering spaces and literally dismantled Falling Hammer from the inside-out." (Candle in the Dark, Ch. 6)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Deconstruction of Falling Dropships

**High Tellus Orbit**   
**7 December 3020**

_Falling Hammer_ shivered as another blast of energy connected with the hull, leaving another small crater in the dropship’s armor plating. Dozens of drones buzzed around the ship like angry hornets, firing randomly and dodging like mad to avoid _Hammer_ ’s medium laser point defenses. One of the drones zigged when it should’ve zagged and a portside laser connected, turning the nuisance into a cloud of debris. On _Hammer_ ’s bridge, a ragged cheer went up as their tormentor exploded.

“Damage report,” the captain asked for what felt like the hundredth time in three hours.

“It’s still superficial, Captain,” the engineer replied. “These things are crazy-fast, but they’ve got no teeth.” _Hammer_ shook again, this time hard enough for alarm klaxons to start wailing. “ _That_ son of a bitch on the other hand,” the engineer growled. “Starboard aft, between the Mech bay door and the engines. Minor damage to armor, no breakthrough.”

“Gunners, where is that coming from and why haven’t you killed it yet!?”

“Skipper, we can’t find the damn thing! It’s still not showing up on radar!”

“You have _eyes_ , don’t you? God fuck all of you! Find it and kill it!”

~***~

Invisible to the crew of the _Falling Hammer_ , a growing patch of the dropship’s armor was slowly turning bright white. A group of drones hugged the hull of the ship, constantly firing energy beams at the glowing spot.

A horde of smaller drones waited all around the piece of boiling armor, zipping back and forth close to the hull and chatting among each other with tiny pulses of light.

_This was taking SO long._

_The cats had said they could carry away anything they found inside!_

_But the hull of this thing was too tough._

_They had to make the cats produce this armor themselves!_

_Oh what they would do with all these new toys._

Finally, the armor of the _Falling Hammer_ buckled and a hole appeared. The small drones immediately rushed forward, sprayed waved coolant on the still glowing hole and raced through it into the ship.

~***~

On the bridge of the _Hammer_ a light bathed the whole room in red and a loud alarm began to scream.

“What?” The captain stared at the alarm light for a moment and then hit the intercom button in front of him. “Everyone grab your helmets... now!” He looked to the engineer besides him. ”What happened?”

“Major hull breach near the engine room, we are losing air!” the engineer replied, visibly confused. “No radar warning, no impact, nothing!”

“Don’t tell me we have a hole and you have no clue how it happened you idiot,” the captain shouted back, “earn your damned pay and give me some answers.”

“And you,” he said, pointing with a finger to a mechwarrior on the bridge, “since you’re not already at your mech, get a damned repair kit and see if you can fix it!”

~***~

On the bridge of the _Serenity Valley_ the holographic silhouette of a _Leopard_ dropship suddenly had a bright red spot on it, followed by increasingly complex scans of the inner layout.

“They just broke through the armor” the catgirl in front of the display cheered, “we are getting good telemetry from the inside of the ship. No hostile contact at the moment.”

For the first time in the history of the _BattleTech_ game, they would finally get internal plans of a dropship. An authentic and consistent internal plan!

“Very good, keep an eye on their progress and feed it back to the Watchtower. Some snipers out there might want to see the plans.”

~***~

The swarm of drones quickly split up, moving to different parts of the ship to secure _interesting_ hardware. Some rushed towards the ships weapon systems, others were looking for the hangars, but one large group were heading for the signature of the huge fusion reactor of the _Hammer_.

They charged forward until they met with a sealed bulkhead. Driven by curiosity, one of the drones opened the cover plate shielding the electronic lock. It began to analyze the unknown hardware inside, shivering in excitement. This was _new_.

Another one scanned the hatch and looked through the tiny porthole.

‘Engine room, one human in suit, lots of toys’ it relayed to its brothers, just as the lock beeped and the door opened.

~***~

Chief engineer Penfield sat strapped to a seat in the engine room when the door opened, revealing a tiny floating something. He stared for a moment, dumbfounded, before reaching for the intercom.

“Captain, we have an unknown floating machine in the engine room” he started just as a group of drones rushed into the room. “SHIT! Lots of machines! I need help!”

“ _Don’t be a fool, shoot them!_ ” the captain’s voice boomed in his ears and he slowly shifted his hand towards his shotgun. The drones had spread all around the engine room, a few of them were even floating in front of him, scanning him with a blue beam of light.

“Just keep calm, they didn’t shoot me, maybe they’re unarmed, maybe they’re just stupid,” he whispered as he finally felt the shotgun’s reassuring grip. “Get out of my sight” he shouted, grabbed the weapon with both hands and fired.

He nearly dropped his gun when a blue shimmering sphere appeared around the drone, stopping his shotgun’s blast in mid air. A chorus of electronic snickering filled his helmet.

“That... that... that’s not possible! That’s cheating! That’s....” His mind went into spinlock. “That’s not FAIR!”

~***~

The _Serenity Valley_ held back, keeping out of range as much as she possibly could. On the bridge a group of catgirls watched as the engines of the _Falling Hammer_ coughed once, struggled for a moment and then died.

“You’re sure they won’t accidentally blow it up?”

“Oh, exocomps are very good at taking things apart, they’ll be okay. I’m more concerned about the group that got destroyed earlier. Their Grid instances are already complaining that we don’t have replacement bodies for them.”

A few giggles did the rounds.

“Look they’ve got something,” the pilot announced, pointing at the image on the main viewscreen. “Do have any idea what they could possibly want with that door?”

“You’re the one who told them they could carry away anything they wanted,” the engineer replied with a giddy giggle, her ears flicking with amusement.


End file.
